Sample Story

In the Old West, well into the 1900’s many people lived solitary, lonely lives…working hard, far away from friends and family. This story brings home how that sort of existence ruled the lives of even the young.

The End of the Line Kid

Christmas Eve’s

Falling snow

Causes horses’

Living breath

Melting flakes

Of transmutation

Into steam

His name was Dave, but everyone called him “The End of

the Line Kid,” at least when they talked about him. No

one talked to him much because he didn’t have much to say.

Being taciturn was acceptable in a land where and at a time

when, so many people were alone for so long. So no one said

or thought much about it. He was just “a quiet kid.”

He lived at the end of the school bus line. Beyond it quite a

ways, actually, for there was always a pinto pony picketed in

the meadow at the end of the road. And the boy rode the horse

some distance, at least to get home.

Evidently, his folks lived beyond the gap and tended toward

the Johnsonville side. At least that is what people assumed,

since they were seen only a few times a year. The Town had its

share of prospectors, trappers, and isolated ranchers, so quite a

few people were scarcely seen but assumed to be in the vicinity.

The school bus itself was a rickety affair and serviceable perhaps

three quarters of the time. The remaining days were covered

with a standby buckboard, or sometimes, in the winter, a

horse-drawn sleigh.

As the fifteen or so students waited along the twenty mile

route, they sometimes tried to outguess the variables of worn

machinery and weather to predict what manner of conveyance

would pick them up. They were sometimes right and sometimes

wrong. One thing was for sure, the End of the Line Kid

never missed a day. He got on silently, usually in the same

worn buckskin pants and shirt. A horse blanket served as a

winter coat and, seemingly out-of-place, a bright, red knitted

wool cap signaled cold weather.

He was about twelve, maybe a bit older. There were no

grades at Miss Joyce’s school. The children read with

whomever was at their level. So, eighteen-year-old Cleve

Stoner read with ten-year-old Millie Shoemaker. Such nervousness

as might have developed over such mismatches was

quickly dispelled by the friendly persuasion and hard work of

her classroom.

The Kid was a hard worker himself and about average for

his age. His slightly freckled face had a concentrated look as

tousled, backwoods hair encroached on its borders from several

directions.

School had started in September, and already, after only a

few weeks, the first signs of autumn were evident in the few

golden patches of cottonwood leaves here and there in the

draws and along the river. Up on the mountain there was more

intense color. In places, the aspen were already bare where an

early freeze had turned the leaves from green to brown and the

wind had plucked them from the branches like so many dried

insects.

Talk in the valley had it that more placer than ever was coming

out of the hills and that spring would sure enough bring

another run for the gold. At this, the merchants and saloon

owners smiled broadly and made plans for increased business.

The ranchers and farmers and plain folks of the community put

it out of their minds if they thought about it at all. What would

come would come. And then they would make whatever

adjustments to their lives were necessary. Miners were a good

enough lot, but with them always came a rougher crowd—the

parasites lured by fortune, both real and imagined, both earned

and taken.

To the children of Miss Joyce’s school, all this made little difference.

Not many authors of Westerns have turned their attention to Christmas. This book, in the tradition of Charles Dickens, is a collection of twenty-one Christmas stories set in the American west of the 1800's. The stories abound with optimism, good news, and romance and are pitched for adults but also of interest to children. The characters include cowboys, outlaws, Indians, gamblers, miners, dance hall girls, bartenders, school children, stage coach drivers, and the usual cross section of interesting characters who peopled the American west in the 1800's.

This book would make a wonderful stocking stuffer for anyone interested in animals, the Old West, or romantic fiction. If you buy more than one copy, I will include a free, new Christmas story written this season.